


When the Stars All Fall

by one_of_those_crushing_scenes



Series: MCU Pre-Be-and-Sequels [3]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Fix-It, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Canonical Character Death, Funeral, Gen, Gratuitous Quantum Theory, Not Very Steve Rogers Friendly, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Post-Canon Fix-It, Who could have predicted I’d ever use that tag?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-15 17:30:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18674245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/one_of_those_crushing_scenes/pseuds/one_of_those_crushing_scenes
Summary: (SPOILERS FOR AVENGERS: ENDGAME)Natasha Romanoff was one of the greats. An original Avenger, a hero, a true friend. Someone who willingly sacrificed her own life to bring back half the universe. But when a mysterious, strange-looking man shows up at her funeral claiming that it’s not that simple, her friends will do anything to get her back.





	When the Stars All Fall

Laura double-checks the thermostat in the greenhouse, then locks up and goes back indoors. She’s been spending a lot of time out there these days. It calms her, being alone with the plants. The thick warm air, instead of being suffocating, feels soothing like a blanket, and when she’s all alone, she doesn’t need to think too closely about the fact that she was dead and now she’s alive. The plants couldn’t give less of a damn.

She has a good excuse for being out there all the time, anyway, since she needed to rebuild the entire thing from scratch. She tried making a joke about it, chiding Clint for not having read her notes and keeping everything up, but he didn’t laugh. In the past, he would have laughed. But he’s been through a lot over the past five years, and...well, she’s sure they’re not the only couple in the world dealing with this. It’ll be okay. They love each other, and eventually, they’ll find how they fit together again.

A knock on the door brings her out of her thoughts. She opens it, finding a tall blond woman she doesn’t recognize on the stoop. The woman has a tense look on her face, and she peers behind Laura into the house as if looking for something before turning back to her. “You must be Laura.” It’s a brisk half-greeting, and she doesn’t introduce herself. “Where is he?”

She’s clearly upset, and she has the same type of demeanor Laura’s seen in dozens of SHIELD agents. She could be dangerous, but somehow, Laura can tell that she’s not a threat. She turns toward the stairway. “Clint!” she calls. “Company!”

It takes a few seconds before his footsteps start to sound. He reaches the third step before his eyes land on the visitor in the doorway, and then he stops, his hand gripping the rail. “Bobbi.”

Ahh. Laura’s heard of Bobbi, though not in years. Certainly not since the Avengers first formed. She used to work with Clint and Nat once in a while back in the day. If she’s here now, it must be because she’s heard—

“Is it true?” Bobbi asks over Laura’s shoulder, sounding wrecked.

Clint’s face is ashen. He nods. Laura knows how guilty he feels over Nat’s death—and she’s been trying to drag him out of there, partially so that she doesn’t have to think about how guilty _she_ feels...after all, the reason Nat was on the mission at all was to bring her and the children, among others, back.

Bobbi makes a choked sound. “She’s dead?”

Clint nods. “I’m so sor—”

“Fury said you were there,” Bobbi says, interrupting him. 

“I was,” he confirms. “Do you want to come in and hear the story?”

—

Laura doesn’t think she can take hearing the details of Nat’s death again, so she offers to go and make tea. When she comes back, Bobbi is silently weeping as Clint finishes up.

“I woke up in a lake somewhere with the stone in my hand,” he says, his voice cracking. “I don’t know how much time had passed. I looked and looked for her to try and bring her back home, but I couldn’t...” He starts to shake as he trails off, and Laura quickly walks over and puts her hand on his shoulder to steady him.

Bobbi wipes her red-rimmed eyes with her sleeves. “Well, that fucking sucks,” she says.

He lets out a surprised laugh. “That’s one way of putting it.”

Laura sets the tea down on the coffee table, then takes a seat. “An apt way of putting it. Nat would have appreciated that.”

Bobbi looks over at her. “I’m sorry for my awful manners,” she apologizes. “I’m Bobbi. But—” she shakes her head, “—you know that. You and Nat were close, too, right?”

Laura swallows around the lump in her throat, remembering all those holiday dinners Natasha used to spend with them, how the kids used to sneak into her bedroom early in the morning, as soon as the sun cracked over the horizon, and demand that she read to them, and how happy she was to do it. “Yeah. She was family.”

“I’m so sorry for your loss,” Bobbi says, reaching her hand out.

Laura takes it. “Thank you. And you, too.”

A few minutes pass silently. Finally, Bobbi picks up her tea and asks, “What are you thinking for a funeral?”

“She didn’t have any family, so we thought we would do something small here,” Laura says.

Bobbi nods. “That sounds nice. You have a really nice place here. I’m sorry, I should have said that earlier.”

“You’re fine, Bobbi,” Clint assures her. Turning to Laura, he says, “What were we thinking—the rest of the Avengers, some old friends from SHIELD who didn’t end up being Nazis, and that’s it, right? She didn’t have any civilian friends.”

Laura nods. “We’d do something outside in the yard, put up a photo, maybe...”

“If there’s anything I can do to help,” Bobbi says.

—

Bobbi and Sharon drive up together the day of the funeral. It’s a long drive, and the radio signal out there is pretty choppy, so most of the ride is spent with Sharon reminding Bobbi about her promise to keep Captain America far away from her.

“I’m still not sure this was a good idea, me coming,” Sharon says. “God knows I loved Nat, but I’m pretty sure I’m going to throw up if I get within ten feet of him.”

Bobbi’s heard the story from Maria, how after the Avengers brought everyone back and defeated Thanos, Rogers had used time travel to create an alternate universe where he showed up out of nowhere to sweep Peggy Carter, former Director of SHIELD and also Sharon’s great aunt, off her feet. Apparently, he lived his entire life off in that other world, and just came back a week or two ago as a hundred-year-old man. Sharon’s been having a hard time wrapping her head around the situation, what with having dated Rogers herself for a few months. Not that Bobbi can blame her.

“I don’t think I can even look at him, Bobbi.” Sharon shudders. “I keep thinking about the fact that there’s some other me out there in some other universe who thinks of him as her great-uncle, but _he_ knows—he _knows_ —” she makes a sick face and turns her head to the side, gagging.

Bobbi nearly veers off the road. “Sharon!” she exclaims, getting control back over the steering wheel and then looking over at her friend in concern. “Are you okay? Check the glove compartment, I might have bags in there.”

“Yeah, no, I’m fine, I’m just...” Sharon waves her off, but she does take a plastic bag out of the glove compartment. “Whatever, it doesn’t matter, you know? It’s not like it was super serious between us. I liked him, I thought I liked him, I—whatever, I’m not heartbroken, I’m just...a little nauseous, that’s all.” 

“Yeah, I can see that,” Bobbi responds, nodding at the bag.

“I knew that Aunt Peggy was part of the team that turned him into a super soldier and that Uncle Daniel’s battalion was rescued by him one time. And I knew that she’d been, you know, into him, and that the interest was mutual. But I didn’t realize it was—” She cuts herself off and takes a deep breath. “I never should have taken that assignment. I never should have spoken to him. Oh, Bobbi, that other Sharon...” She shakes her head.

“Maybe let’s talk about something else,” Bobbi suggests.

When they reach the farm, there’s a whole row of cars lined up, and Bobbi realizes that the Bartons are officially on the map now. Which means either that Clint is serious about his retirement this time, or that this occasion is so important that it overrules his “nobody finds out about the wife and kids” rule.

They get out of the car, and a man Bobbi recognizes as Sam Wilson (the new Captain America, as the rumor goes) meets them at the top of the hill. He gives Sharon a hug and says, “Glad you put on your big girl pants this morning.”

Sharon thwacks him gently on the head with her purse. “Did I ask?”

“You ask for my help, you get my opinion,” Wilson retorts with a grin. He turns to Bobbi and sticks out his hand. “Sam Wilson. I hear you’re my co-Steve-sitter?”

“Looks like it.” Bobbi laughs and shakes his hand. “Bobbi Morse.”

They walk down to where the service has been set up. There’s a photo on an easel, just like Laura had mentioned. Bobbi can tell from Natasha’s hairstyle that the photo is from eight years ago, when she tried out a chin-length haircut. She looks alive and happy, and it hits Bobbi _again_ that she’s never ever going to see Nat again in her life.

Her gaze is so focused on the picture of Nat that she doesn’t notice Steve Rogers approaching until it’s too late. He comes in from the left, with Sharon right in the middle, and opens his mouth to say hello. Sharon steps on Bobbi’s foot with the pointed toe of her shoe, and Bobbi moves neatly in front of her, elbowing her out of the way as if she’s just too excited to meet Captain America and she can’t hold herself back.

“Hi!” Bobbi says, pitching her voice a little higher than usual. “I can’t believe I’m meeting you in person! I’m Bobbi Morse, agent of SHIELD. This is so exciting!”

Rogers looks a little taken aback, but he recovers quickly and gives her a genuinely friendly smile. “Steve Rogers. Nice to meet you.”

Bobbi tucks her arm into Rogers’s elbow and starts to lead him away. “You’ll never believe this, but I used to be part of a project at SHIELD that was trying to duplicate Erskine’s procedure with you. Never went anywhere, especially after our head decided the whole thing was unethical and that the project needed to be chucked.”

“Hmmm, how interesting,” Rogers says politely.

“And now I’m meeting you in the flesh!” Bobbi adds, running out of things to say. How long is she supposed to engage this guy? What’s her exit strategy here? They should have planned this out better.

Clint comes over then and hugs both her and Rogers. “Can I introduce you to everyone?” he asks her.

That means she’ll need to leave Rogers duty. She looks around and manages to make eye contact with Sam Wilson, who starts to walk over. Bobbi and Clint leave Rogers in his hands, and he introduces her to his non-SHIELD friends: Bucky Barnes, James Rhodes, King T’Challa of Wakanda and his head general Okoye, Scott Lang, Dr. Bruce Banner, Pepper Potts-Stark, Wanda Maximoff, and Carol Danvers. Laura and the kids are around too, as are Nick Fury and Maria Hill, and lots of somber hugs are exchanged.

After a few minutes, everyone settles down, and they start the ceremony. Rogers speaks first, and Bobbi is surprised to see him breaking down in tears as he talks about the way Nat kept him and the whole team together after the Snap. It’s weird, the Avengers being quasi-celebrities and Natasha being an old friend. Hard to imagine this whole life Nat apparently made for herself, but it makes Bobbi happy that she apparently found some sort of family with these people.

Maria goes next. She tells some stories that Bobbi remembers first-hand, mostly about the outrageous shenanigans that their whole group of friends used to get up to behind Fury’s back. She gets a few laughs from everyone, while Fury shakes his head and mutters, “You really thought I didn’t know.” Maria laughs through her tears and paints a picture of the secret agent Natasha that not everyone in this crowd had the pleasure of knowing.

But there’s one person here who knew Nat as both a SHIELD agent and an Avenger. Clint stands up to speak as Maria leaves the podium, and Bobbi can hear the sniffling all around here even before he reaches the front.

“Natasha was my best friend,” he says. “Before I met her, I was a dumb, cocky guy with a bow who thought he had all the answers.”

Bobbi catches sight of Cooper, Clint’s oldest kid. He’s looking up at his father, tears streaming down his cheeks.

Clint continues, “She taught me to look beyond the—” he lets out an involuntary squeak, “—sorry, to look beyond the surface.” He takes a deep breath. “To see that people are—” he’s openly crying now as he speaks, fitting his words in between his sobs, “—so much more—than what you see at first glance. I owe her so—much—so much, I can never—”

His face just crumples, and Bobbi’s vision turns cloudy as her own tears spill over. She doesn’t try to stop them, not today, not when they’re saying goodbye to Natasha for the last time. She leans on Sharon and Sharon leans on her and they cry together as Clint chokes out a few more words about how sorry he is that he wasn’t able to save her and how much of a hole her absence leaves in all of their lives: the Avengers, the ex-SHIELD family, the Bartons.

“She didn’t know how loved she was,” Clint finishes, drying his eyes with a tissue. “I hope, with everything inside of me, that she knows now.”

—

After the service, they pull the chairs together in a circle. Sam and Bucky bring over a few cases of beer, and they take turns telling stories. Bobbi watches everyone, trying to get the measure of the people she doesn’t know yet. One thing she notices is that Bucky clearly has something on his mind. He doesn’t speak at all, but his jaw is clenched, and he presses his lips together like he wants to say something but he won’t let himself do it.

Rhodes is in the middle of reminiscing about a time when Nat bet Rogers that she could beat him blindfolded in a fight, which had somehow led to both of them being blindfolded, which ended up with someone stealing both of their shoes and never returning them, which reminds him that he has a confession to—

He stops speaking, looking at something in the distance. Everyone turns and follows his gaze, as a figure approaches them. He looks like a man, but he has shining golden skin and hair, and his eyes are all white. Bobbi slides her staves to the bottom of her sleeves, just in case, and she sees Clint reaching for his bow. Carol Danvers stands and walks by herself over to the man and starts speaking to him. They talk quietly for a minute, and then she brings him back over to the rest of the group.

He introduces himself as Warlock. As luck would have it, he’s looking for the same soul stone that’s the reason they’re gathered in the first place. “For a long time, I was the host of the stone,” he explains. “When I lost it, I was still able to sense it. For years it was hidden away on Vormir, never used. Then, about five years ago...well, I suppose you all know what the Mad Titan did with it.”

“You know Thanos?” Rogers blurts out.

“Only by reputation. After I felt the stone being used, I tracked down its energy signature, but I was too late. The stones had been destroyed, and Thanos slain.”

“Oh, that last part was us,” Rhodes says, a little sheepish.

“I thought that was the end of it, but a few weeks ago, out of the blue, I felt it being used again. I followed it to this planet, but it was gone again by the time I arrived. The Ancient One told me that perhaps you lot could help me.”

Everyone looks to Rogers.

“We took it from the past,” Rogers says. “From Vormir, in 2014, and brought it back here to defeat Thanos. But then I returned it.”

“I see.” Warlock nods. He looks around the circle. “I’m sorry. Am I interrupting...?”

“It’s a memorial service,” Laura explains. “For our friend—actually, the one who sacrificed herself for the soul stone.”

Warlock frowns. “A memorial service for—?” He tries again. “I’m sorry, this is a custom I’m unfamiliar with. Is it like a rebirth ceremony?”

An awkward silence falls over the group. Finally, Maria says, “No, it’s pretty much the opposite. We’re celebrating her life, in her death.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand.” Warlock turns to Rogers. “I thought you said you returned the soul stone to Vormir.”

“That’s right,” Rogers confirms.

Warlock gives all of them a strange look, like he’s not sure why no one is understanding him. They all look back at him, waiting.

Finally, he speaks. “Well, if that’s the case, then your friend is alive.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I know, the Russos said that putting the stone back doesn't get you the person back—well, it's fiction and I say it does! Also, of course she gets a funeral, are you kidding me.


End file.
